


Monster Movie

by crowleyshouseplant



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Genderqueer, Shapeshifting, Supernatural AU: Croatoan/End'verse, Supernatural AU: Psychic Kids Live
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-31
Updated: 2011-10-31
Packaged: 2017-10-25 14:18:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/271219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crowleyshouseplant/pseuds/crowleyshouseplant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A shapeshifter saves Ava Wilson, who did not turn bad and is an integral part of Dean Winchester's crew in the End verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monster Movie

**Author's Note:**

> tw: misgendering, violence

It’s not easier or safer being a child. But they’re smaller. They’re easier to hide in.

That’s the problem with children.

They’re too small to fight.

Ne should have just crawled away into the sewers and let the others save this one with the blue eyes. But they had been too far away, and the person that the one with blue eyes had been trying to save was already dead, Croat food, and the one with Blue Eyes had screamed, shooting bullets until their gun was empty, but they wouldn't run, and so ne had run towards them instead, shedding nir skin so that ne could fight, and ne had, had ripped those Croats apart.

Ne wishes ne was still a child. But the body ne has now, it’s strong and it’s big, with arms that lope to the ground as ne crouches over someone with blood in their hair. It’s too big to scuttle into the drain and skitter down the sewers where it stinks and it’s safe.

Someone whom the other humans call Dean points and waves a gun at nem, like all he wants to do is kill nem because a few paces away there’s nir shucked skin, too small to fend off the Croats that had been coming. They would have killed and eaten the person below nem who’s coughing blood, but ne can’t smell the infection on them so that’s the only reason ne hasn’t finished them off—but despite all that, despite everything, the human called Dean wants to kill nem and ne doesn’t understand because the person is safe, stained red but safe, already scrambling to their feet.

A bearded man and a man in camo try to stop the human called Dean. Ne flicks nir tongue and tastes the air. The stale scent of rotted humanity but otherwise nothing new, nothing fresh. No Croats. They might have time to finish this conversation after all.

Ne wonders if they’ll kill nem, like they do the Croats.

Ne eases away from the one with the blue eyes and the others cry out to her,  _Ava Ava_   _are you okay_ and to one another _is she okay she's okay isn't she_ so ne says, “Maria? Ava Maria? Full of grace?” It sounds out of place in the air, like it’s the wrong thing to say.

They stop and they stare at nem and ne crouches lower. Be small, like the child before. Make them see the little boy again.

“The fuck did you say?” Dean says.

“Dean,” the bearded man says before turning toward nem. “It’s actually ‘ave’—” and then he glances down at his shuffling shoes and ne doesn’t understand and wonders if something got scrambled in the transition because sometimes that happened if the change is too long in coming and everything is strange and new.

“Why are we talking about this?” Dean says. His gun makes a clicking noise and ne recognizes that noise from before, from when ne had the old body instead of this new one and they had found out that nir skin wasn’t really nirs, not like it was for them. “It killed her.”

Ne shakes nir head. “Already dead. She was already dead.”

“It doesn’t change anything,” Dean says. “You’re still a monster. Probably killed lots of people.” His finger’s on the trigger, but he doesn’t pull it.

The bloody haired one with blue eyes snaps her fingers, gets right up in Dean’s face, stands on the tips of her boots so she’s that handful of inches taller. “Hey. Big Guy. She just saved my life, okay? Nobody’s killing anybody.”

“We have real people back in camp,” Dean says. “Who need food to survive.”

And Ava laughs and laughs, but then says, “She saved my life. Besides,” and she turned back to nem, kneeled down before nem, gripped nir chin with her fingers. “I bet you know this city real well, don’t you? Know all the hidden nooks and crannies, don’t you?”

Ne nods because it’s true. Ne’s a child living in the sewers and the gutter for years.

Dean appraises the situation, then puts his gun back in the holster. “Bring it,” he says, and then he’s going off to the vehicle and the man in camo and the Ava lady guides nem by the elbows and shuffles nem into a truck.

They give nem a cabin and they lock it on the outside. They give nem food and let nem out to relieve biological functions.

It’s like being in the sewers only ne can’t leave when ne wants to.

Ne tries to get out but there’s no way and ne does not want to be shot even if ne succeeded. The patrols are always on duty. They are always alert because if they weren’t, they could die. Everybody could die.

The Ava Lady comes sometimes with food and keeps nem company while ne eats. She says things, talks about Dean, about his brother Sam who’s gone away even though Ava talks like he’s still alive. Talks about how much Dean misses his brother Sam and the Ava Lady’s mouth falls open and her eyes grow limpid and sad like he’s not some devil but somebody she might have loved once upon a time, and ne tries to understand but ne doesn’t remember having siblings or their names or where they once came from or where they are going or where they have been.

“It’s because you prayed, you know, that you’re still alive,” Ava says one day. “Chuck liked the symmetry of it. Guess that’s not so surprising. Since he’s kind of like this prophet who used to be a writer.” She puts her finger in her mouth. “Or maybe it’s the other way around. Well here, anyway.” And she gives nem half a sandwich.

“Blessed are you among women,” ne says because Ava brings food and stays instead of just shoving it through a padlocked flap, and Ava lets her touch her face, trace tiny miniscule freckles from the sun with nir too big finger.

“Fuck you,” Ava says without moving from the finger and without the harsh edge that blades so many of the others’ words towards nem. Maybe it’s because she laughs and smiles when she says it. “I’m no virgin. Between you and me,” she says, leaning closer and whispering so that her breath is hot on nir face – “I’ve killed people.”

“So have I,” ne says. “Does that mean we’re the same?” Should ne change into Ava? Would they let nem go outside for a single breath of free air if ne looked like one of them?

Ava reaches through nir scalp, fingers pulling at the hairs curling around the curve of nir head, palm flat across nir skull. “I don’t think so.”

The Ava Lady turns to go, then stops. “You know what’s funny?” she says to the wall.

If ne turned into a wall would other people look at nem in the eyes?

“I saw you change. I saw your frightened little eyes in the sewer. And I saw you rip that skin off. Heard your bones pop. And I was thinking, oh my god, what the fuck am I watching—I have seen so much weird shit but seeing you change from this frightened kid to this amazon woman takes the fucking cake. Because you know what? I’d still have survived without your help. You didn’t need to save me.” She spreads her arms, swaying a little. “Because I’m immune, you know. All the Psychic kids are.” And finally she turns and says, “Do you ever think about that? Do you ever think about what you could have done instead, what you could be doing now?”

There’s something in nir eyes and then the Ava Lady’s there, crooning, “Shhh, don’t cry. Don’t say a word.”

But ne doesn’t listen. “I would say Ave Maria, Ave Maria, Ave Maria because I would have thought that you were dead and I would say Ave Maria Ave Maria Ave Maria and hope the stone walls made my voice echo to the skies so that Maria would hear me.”

“Do you even know who Maria is?” she says.

And ne pauses, trying to remember back that far. “He said it. When he was dying. And sometimes I remember it.”

“Who said it? The boy you looked like from before?”

Ne nods. “I did. Years and years and years and years ago.” Ne pauses. “Sometimes, I like to change the memory so that I didn’t die and Maria came to save me like I asked her to.”

“You’re not that little boy anymore or ever for that matter—you know that, right?”

“Yes, I am.”

“You’re a shifter who has a different shape now.”

“Too,” ne says.

And then the Ava Lady leaves because she has no words to say because she doesn’t understand and ne just wants her to come back because it’s so quiet, and ne tries to fill up the quiet with nir own voice but then the guards bang on the doors and tell nir to shut the hell up.

If ne were a mouse, ne could squeak and squeak and squeak and nobody would hear nem and that would be worse because what if they forgot to feed nem?

One day after a long while of wooden walls, they come for nem. They take nem to the town. They tell nem that there are demons but they need one of them, they need a certain one, and that ne has to show them the most hidden way to get to point x and to warn them if the demons approach their position and ne nods because ne misses the sewers, misses tasting nothing on the air but cooking meat, soiled clothes, and smoking wood

They wait for the demons and ne says, They’re coming, they’re coming but it comes out in whimpers and ne isn’t sure if they hear or understand, but maybe they do because Dean shakes his head and checks his gun, and then the air bangs and shatters the tissue thin paper in nir ears and it hurts, it hurts so bad and ne clutches at those ears and they tear in nir palms because ne grips them too hard and nir body wants to change, wants to hide, wants to get the fuck away because ne will die, because nobody’s gonna give a fuck about nem not when there are all those demons coming after them, each one of them black-lidded and taunting them, trying to drag Dean out in the open because they want him, they want him so bad, and nir body changes and nir hands become larger and broader and the back becomes broader and doesn’t fit the clothes they gave to nem so long ago, but when ne finally staggers from behind the rubble, the demons see nem and they are gleeful because they’ve found Dean and they just want nem and there’s this rush of warmth because they want nem, they want nem so bad, and ne stands with arms outspread, waiting for them, before Dean’s party flanks them and they scatter, until the Ava Lady forces the one they’re looking for to stay with a demon of her own, to stay like some dog for their pleasure and their amusement, and they look at nem like ne’s ugly and foul and they don’t want nem near them, and ne doesn’t understand because they have what they want and they have who they want and ne helped them achieve all of that.

And then Dean’s fist is in nir face and it hurts, it hurts so badly as tissue and skin rips beneath his knuckles. And then, just as suddenly, he stops and he walks away without a word, shaking the pain from his hand.

“What were you thinking?” says the Ava Lady, “turning into Dean like that?”

“They wanted him. They just wanted him.”

“Nice distraction,” Ava says, clapping nem on the shoulder. “But Dean won’t see it that way.”

Ne trudges naked and alone and behind everyone else because there is no place else at all to go. But ne sees Dean look behind and ne pretends that, if he saw that ne were missing, he would have told them to find nem because they needed nem, they needed nem to taste the croats and the demons and all the other bad things in the dark.

Dean comes to nir cabin. Ne tastes him first then hears the slip and slide and click of the key in the padlock. “Change,” he says. “Change into someone else.”

Ne stands, reflects Dean’s posture, the way his legs are bent crooked, the way his head is bowed, the way his eyes are flinty fragments. “No.”

He raises his fist and punches nem in the jaw. Ne hits back, harder, and his head whiplashes. Eyes water at the pain, but he doesn’t care. He just does it again, and ne does it again because it’s what Dean is doing and ne will take whatever Dean will give nem because ne starves and starves and the Ava Lady is only one person and not always there.

And Dean presses nem against the wall, mouth inches from nir lips, breath hot and wet. The muscles in his face tremble and shiver like they want to break but they can’t, no not yet, like they just can’t. Ne grasps his wrists with nir hands, gasping for breath, booted feet scrabbling at the wall.

“I never should have saved you,” he says then.

Ne squeezes nir eyes closed and open, open and closed. “Why do you want to hurt you?”

“You’re not me.” Spit falls on nir face.

“I am,” ne says. “I am you too.”

He slams his fist against nir jaw as if that would make nem be quiet, to just shut up like he wants nem to. And ne kicks him because if this is what he does to nem this is what he wants and ne is glad that there’s somebody else besides the walls and Ava, and ne could not turn this away because it’s sweeter than oxygen, it’s better than food, and they fight each other until Dean grips too deep and he flays the flesh from nem and it hurts because the air stings it and he will see, and he can’t see because not even ne has seen, not ever been without a face because people without faces are dead because nobody will give them water or food or air or skin to skin and so they will slowly starve.

So ne crouches on the floor and knits a new skin while Dean watches from the floor, lips torn and bloody and bruising.

Ne knows what Dean wants because the Ava Lady has told nem so many times over, and ne knows that she will always see nem, talk to nem over meat and sour water, but ne is so hungry and so ne knits the skin that Dean wants more than anything. And because ne has a new skin and a new face, the other one going away just like the little boy went away still muttering words on his lips before his heart stopped, ne says, “Pray for us sinners, now, and in the hour of our death,” just like before and always and forever.

When Dean sees, when he understands, ne wonders if he’ll fight again or maybe if he’ll collapse and they will hug because this is the face which he wants beyond all faces, but he doesn’t do any of that. He just leaves and never comes back.

And ne just has a face that nobody wants to see, even Ava because when she comes with her food and her voice and her face, she crumples on the inside out and she says, “Jesus. What the fuck did you do that for?”

“I’m hungry,” ne says, and the Ava Lady gives her food and stares at her, but doesn’t talk at all because what is there to say?

Maybe they’ll hate nem so much that they will let nem go. But they don’t and sometimes they bring nem out to help them avoid Croats and demons but that’s it and so ne quietly starves and refuses to turn back because what if ne chooses a face that is completely invisible and they just forgot that ne sits there all alone in that little cabin with the silver padlocks?

Then one day, when ne sleeps, they come—the demons and the croats—and even though ne pounds and pounds the walls, screaming, the guards ignore nem because ne always shouts and screams even though ne tries so hard not to but something ne just can’t help it because the walls are too close and there’s nobody there to fill in the empty spaces.

And ne's desperate, and nobody comes, and ne wants somebody to come so bad ne tears the skin from nir bones, tears and tears until there is no bloody scrap of Sam Winchester and then ne remembers that the croats are coming, the demons are coming and they will tear everyone including nemself apart and so ne stops before it’s finished and pounds again, and the wood splinters beneath nir skinless, faceless fist and so ne does it again and again until there is no more wood and when the guards see nem, they pale and scream and shoot their stupid bullets at nem which don’t do anything because ne runs too fast for them.

Ne runs through the woods, runs faster and better without a second skin, without a face to weigh nem down. And the demons see nem, and the demons run because they’ve never seen someone without a face before, someone who doesn’t care that ne no longer has a face, someone who has nothing more to lose because there is nothing more that they can take away from nem—it won’t be like before, when Dean gripped his fingers in nir skin and pulled because there is nothing, absolutely nothing left.

And when the demons and the Croats are gone, ne tastes their blood which is funny because ne had always been told that ne had never had a face so how could ne have a tongue if ne didn’t have a face, so ne finds a shallow almost gone pool of water and there ne is.

Ne doesn’t look like any of the other faces. The skin ripples and flexes and the eyes burn translucent and pale, like they wait to adopt a color and a shape. But the tongue is pink and fleshy and ne wonders if nir tongue was always thus, if under every single adopted face, there was this part of nem that had always been nirs and no one else’s, and suddenly fat lobs of water drop from those translucent eyes, and ne wonders if those had been nirs as well instead of somebody else’s for every other time ne has felt them fall down nir cheeks.

For the first time, ne feels the wind, a soft tickling caress, skin-to-skin contact that leaves goosebumps and good feelings somewhere in nir stomach. The grass is skin-to-skin contact, coarse and brown from the lack of rain and so ne jerks away from the shallow pool of water and drops to nir knees and lets nir water wet the ground, feeding the starving grass with everything ne has left to give.

Ne doesn’t return to the camp. Sometimes ne lurks, sometimes ne skulks, sometimes ne just checks in to see that the Ava Lady is still there, safe and sound. And once, when ne was standing outside, watching all those people waiting for the world to end, Dean Winchester goes on his patrol and ne, because ne can run faster than him now, steps on a twig in the dark and it goes snap, jerking him around, bringing him to stiffness, and he tries to taste the air, just like ne used to do for him. “Who’s there?”

And ne doesn’t answer him because ne doesn’t crave the sound of his voice like before, doesn’t crave for him to call nem that name he so desperately wanted to speak.

“Is that you, shapeshifter?” he says.

And ne wonders why he would remember nem when he so desperately wanted to forget nem, to erase nir face before he even saw nir real one. But ne snaps a twig again because it’s almost true and it’s not Dean’s fault that he doesn’t know that ne is a shape, nir shape, and that ne will die before ne shifts again, before ne burdens nemself with the burden of a second skin, the second skin that made nir too heavy to live, that forced nir to ground, to sewers, stinking and low and alone.

“We would have died in that ambush,” Dean says to the empty air. He opens his mouth and then he closes it, lips pursed and head nodding. “We just. Yeah.” And he rubs his palm against his mouth. “But you probably already knew that when you bust out. But—I know it, too. We all do.” And then he walks away and ne does not follow after.

But ne lingers around the camp, and when a demon or a Croat wanders too close, ne fills nir belly. And, sometimes, when ne stumbles across a plate of food smelling like the Ava-Lady, ne feels full even before tasting a single bite.


End file.
